Devi Annapoorna- she who fulfills (Purna) the requirement of nourishment (anna or grain) is an incarnation of goddess Parvati who is revered in the Hindu pantheon as the personification of maternal benevolence who nurtures her children as Maa (mother) who prepares heavenly feast and Shakti (energy) which is derived from it. In this Swamimalai bronze Maa Annapoorna, you can experience the divinity that lies in a mother’s life-affirming affection.
Devi Annapoorna is placed on a two-tiered lotus platform with two holes in them, hinting at the movable status of this Utsava murti (icon used during festive processions), which is carried on the shoulders of devotees who hold the rods that pass through the hollow space in the pedestal of the mother goddess.
The bronze Maa Annapoorna sits in the posture of royal ease- “Lalitasana”, wearing a fine dhoti (lower body garment) that clings pleasingly to her legs forming fine folds and a fan-shaped pleat which is strikingly delineated in this Panchaloha statue. On her head, Devi Annapoorna has an elongated Kiritamukuta crown with precise incised lines adorning it.
Her ornaments consist of disc-shaped earrings (Dehri), Mala (necklaces), Kuchabandha (breast band), Keyura (armbands), Kada (bracelets), and a thin Channavira (sacred thread-like ornament-making a cirss-cross pattern on Devi’s torso). Her left hand is placed on her side, palm upwards which is used to carry the bowl full of sweet foodgrains and her right hand is in the Katakhastha mudra, in which the goddess holds a golden, jewel-studded ladel with which she serves the pursuers who come to take refuge in her.
The reverse of the Panchaloha bronze Annapoorna Maa murti shows a circular Shirachakra (head ornament) and the richly presented creases of her dhoti. Devi’s round face is beautified by her large eyes, sharp nose and inwardly smiling lips. Endowed with the impeccable glistening of bronze, this goddess Annapoorna icon is enlivened with the divine life-giving supremacies of the great mother goddess, in whose court even Shiva Mahadeva comes seeking her nourishing powers. Devi’s compassionate presence in any home enriches its inhabitants with her potencies and protects them from the unforeseen dangers of hunger, famine and poverty.
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